Board of Directors

Officers:

Angela Tripi-Weiss, Executive Director, is an award winning artist, teacher, curriculum/program developer and administrator. She has always focused on the development of children’s voices through the arts. Her Arts in Action Visual Art Program teaches students an age appropriate visual arts language that is sequentially skilled. Children are exposed to the arts through various media form and are led to discover, explore, enjoy and express their individual visions. This is all accomplished in a highly supportive setting that fosters creative thinking. In addition to her work with children, she has also developed and implemented a creative process known as "Abstract Visualization". This mental health process was recently incorporated into the treatment of rescue workers and survivors of 9/11. Mental health professionals at Saint Vincent’s Hospital in downtown Manhattan were trained to utilize this technique.

Ms. Tripi-Weiss was the artist in residence and art program coordinator for P.S. 87 and the Special Music School in NYC. She created the "Healing Arts" exhibit, a body of 40 works created by the rescuers and survivors of 9/11, shown in 2004 and 2005 at the West Park Presbyterian and Jan Hus Churches in New York City. She was the program director and art educator at Day Camp in the Park in Bear Mountain, NY. She is a per diem workshop developer and classroom art teacher at the American Museum of Natural History. She has exhibited at the West Side Artists Coalition juried exhibit at the Ansonia and Cork Galleries.

Larry Weiss, President, Director of Construction and Development for a New York City based real estate company with over 30 years of experience in the real estate industry and a life long New Yorker with a keen interest in the arts and sciences.

Rie Schmidt, Treasurer, Flutist, member of American Symphony Orchestra, Westchester Philharmonic and Flute Force, teacher at Bloomingdale School of Music, the 92nd Street Y School of Music, Suzuki Music School of Westport, CT and the Allen-Stevenson School

Jenia Fridlyand is an independent photographer. After graduating from the University of Michigan where she studied biophysics, Jenia moved to Paris to attend a photography school, and eventually came to New York and settled on the UWS with her family. Both of her children are past/present students at Arts in Action.

Peter Salwen (www.salwen.com) is a Manhattan-based artist and writer, a licensed NYC tour guide and a freelance publicist for companies in the environmental science, consulting and engineering fields. He has been proudly associated with Arts in Action since the mid-1990s, when his children were students (and his wife Peggy was the school Librarian) at P.S. 87.

Rena Shapiro, was born and raised on the upper west side in Manhattan. Shapiro is the curator of her family owned gallery in Sherman, CT. She has been VP of fundraising at her children's school for 7 years and hopes that her art and fundraising experience will be of assistance on the board of AIAVAP. 2 out of Shapiro's 3 children are past/present students at Arts in Action VAP.

Advisory Board:

Bill Bartlett, Director of The Imagine Project. A dynamic theatre arts program that has been empowering children throughout NYC for the past 20 years. For more info, go to http://www.imagineproject.org/

Adam Berkowitz, LCSW, DCSW: Psychotherapist for Brooklyn Center for Psychotherapy’s On-Site School Mental Health Program and Out-Patient Mental Health Clinic, Private Practitioner with Children, Adolescents and Adults in New York City, Psychoanalytic Candidate at the Institute for Psychoanalytic Training and Research (IPTAR).

Iona Lutey is a freelancer. She has spent years in sales and marketing in the corporate world and now does community organizing, event planning and communications for environmental groups and non-profit groups.

Ann Miller is the Assistant Director at the Steven Gaynor School of Learning Disabilities in Manhattan, and a professional photographer with an honorable mention in The Who's Who in Photography.

Anne Murney is the Assistant Director of after school programing at the William T. Sherman Elementary school in Manhattan.

Arts in Action VAP

Arts in Action Visual Art Program is a 501c3 non-profit organization that provides a fine art education to children of all ages regardless of economic status. AIAVAP teaches a sequentially structured curriculum that is fun to learn!